A. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to a stand-alone flat bed scanner or hand-held scanner and which incorporates a contact image sensor (CIS) module.
B. Description of the Prior Art
CIS modules and monorail carriages are known; however their use heretofore has been limited to flat bed scanners of the photocopier or facsimile type, as described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,957,689 and 5,610,731. Additionally, specific carriage arrangements for CIS modules are known, such as described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,528,410; 5,579,128 for scanners which are unidentified in those documents but which are believed to be directed to scanners in which the document rather than the sensor module is moved, i.e., scanners of the type described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,489,995.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,793,812 describes a hand-held scanner with a rod, or xe2x80x9cSelfocxe2x80x9d lens and CCD array and U.S. Pat. No. 5,258,858 describes a linear sensor array in a variety of scanner types. Contact-image sensors per se, are known, such as described in the U.S. Pat. No. 4,939,591.
It is an object of the invention to provide a scanner that employs a contact-image module, the glass cover of which is removed and the module placed under the glass surface of a flat bed scanner of the type commonly used as a stand-alone computer peripheral.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a contact image sensor module for flat bed scanner used a stand-alone computer peripheral and which extends the full width of the scanning area to provide a 1:1 scanning ratio, using a rod or Selfoc lens to focus the image onto the image sensors.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide a flat bed scanner of the type commonly used as a stand-alone computer peripheral in combination with a contact image sensor module and a scanner carriage that can be in the form of a monorail with low friction strips used to prevent tipping of the module into the glass.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a flat bed scanner of the type commonly used as a stand-alone computer peripheral in combination with a contact image sensor module and paper sensors to control the beginning and the end of the scanning.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a flat bed scanner of the type commonly used as a stand-alone computer peripheral in combination with a contact image sensor module and paper sensors to show as to accomplish scanning in two directions, thus saving the need for carriage return prior to the next scan.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a hand-held scanner of the type commonly used as a stand-alone computer peripheral in combination with a contact image sensor module either with, or with a motor driven feed mechanism and which can scan the entire width of a standard sheet of paper in a single pass.
With reference to the above-described objects, the present invention provides a flat bed scanner commonly used as a stand-alone computer peripheral in combination with a contact image sensor module that extends the full width of the scanning area to provide a 1:1 scanning ratio using a rod or xe2x80x9cSelfocxe2x80x9d lens to focus the image onto the image sensor, that the scanner carriage can be in the form of a monorail with low friction strips used to prevent tipping of the module into the glass that the scanner employs a contact image sensor module, the glass cover which is removed and the module placed under the glass surface of the scanner, and that the scanner can include paper sensors to control the beginning and end of the scanning. Also, scanning can be accomplished in two directions so as to save the need for carriage return prior to the next scan. Finally, the present invention provides for a hand-held scanner of the type commonly used as a stand-alone computer peripheral in combination with a contact image sensor module either with or without a motor driven feed mechanism and which hand-held CIS scanner can scan the entire width of a standard size sheet of paper in a single pass.